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Study: California
Women “Falling Behind”—and Held Back by Budget Cuts
by Zaineb Mohammed, New America
Media
February 3, 2012
Picture Credit: newamericamedia.org
SAN
FRANCISCO--Women are recovering from the recession at a slower rate
than men according to a new report by the California Budget Project
(CBP) published in partnership with the Women’s Foundation of
California.
The report, titled, “Falling Behind: The Impact of the Great Recession
and the Budget Crisis on California’s Women and Their Families, " was
released on Feb. 1.
In a telephone briefing with the media on Thursday, Jean Ross, CBP's
executive director commented, “The Great Recession hit single mothers
particularly hard and contributed to a sharp increase in poverty among
female-headed families with children.”
Ross added, “Older women faced a rise in poverty, as well. The
recession eroded women’s retirement savings, causing them to remain in
the workforce to rebuild their savings.”
Slow to Share in Economic
Recovery
As the economy gradually recovers in California, Ross noted, women have
been slow to share in areas such as job growth.
“California’s job market is slowly recovering, but recent data suggest
that women have not shared equally in the state’s modest employment
gains,” said Ross during the briefing.
Ross emphasized in an interview with New America Media, “Single moms
have not fared well in this struggling recovery. When people say you
need to get a job faster and work more hours, that just doesn’t reflect
what’s available in this labor market. Workweeks are shrinking and jobs
are scarce.”
Judy Patrick, the president and CEO of the Women’s Foundation of
California, commented during the briefing, “We have to have a public
system for when the economy isn’t working well enough to support these
populations.”
However, Governor Jerry Brown’s 2012-13 budget proposal outlined cuts
to public programs that have alarmed advocates for children, elders,
minorities and others vulnerable groups. Ross said women would also be
among those most negatively impacted.
Reductions facing CalWorks, which assists economically struggling
families, and childcare programs were among the budget cuts that
concerned Ross the most.
Ross observed that the state has made cuts to CalWorks multiple times
since 2008, reductions totaling $3.3 billion. Those include funding
rollbacks for services meant to help parents find and keep jobs.
“These cuts mean that low-income families will have a harder time
keeping a roof over their heads and making ends meet,” said Ross during
the briefing. “Everybody understands that childcare is critical to a
single parent’s ability to remain in the workforce, to be productive at
the job, to know his or her children are well taken care of.”
Cuts Pull Rug From Under
Families With Children
In an interview, Ross explained that federal and state welfare reform
laws implemented in the mid-1990's limited the time people could
receive benefits and required them to find work eventually.
But those laws also recognized that the jobs typically available for
people on cash assistance programs usually don’t pay enough to support
a family or enable them to afford childcare. So the state promised
those parents a safe place for their children to go while they were at
work
“When you cut those programs, you’re pulling the rug out from under
families, who assumed that their part of the bargain was to get a job
and in exchange they wouldn’t have to worry about where their kids
were,” said Ross.
According to the “Falling Behind” report, cuts made in the 2011-12
budget are expected to eliminate care programs for over 35,000
children. Proposed cuts for 2012-13 would eliminate 62,000 more spaces
in state-supported childcare programs.
Cuts to healthcare programs, such as Medi-Cal, will also
disproportionately affect women, who make up two-thirds of those on the
state’s Medicaid program.
Ross was particularly concerned with the impact of Medi-Cal cuts on
women because more than half of the women in the program are in their
peak reproductive years, and many others are seniors with very low
income.
College Cuts Hit Women
Hardest
During the media briefing, Ross noted that budget cuts to higher
education have also affected women disproportionately.
“Higher education is critical to providing pathways to opportunity. In
the past three decades, the hourly earnings of women with a B.A. or
more have increased by 37 percent. Those women with just a high school
degree have risen by 2 percent,” said Ross.
She pointed out that increasing student fees and declining course
offerings haave caused the number of California high school graduates
attending a college or university to decline, most significantly at
community colleges.
The report found that from the 2007 to 2010 fiscal years, enrollment in
community colleges dropped by approximately 130,000 students, and women
accounted for 82 percent of that reduction. The most substantial drops
were among young women, ages 19 or younger, and older women, 35 or
older.
Asked who has been hardest hit by the recession, Ross responded,
“Single mothers with children--in terms of everything, increased
poverty, poor employment prospects.”
She also stressed that because ethnic women of color are more likely to
go to community colleges and tend have low incomes, the education
reductions especially affect them. For example, Ross said, half of the
population served by CalWorks is Latino.
Patrick, of the Woman’s Foundation of California, also expressed her
concern about older women because of steep reductions in the In-Home
Supportive Services program and other services for seniors and people
with disabilities.
When discussing possible solutions to avoid these cuts and improve the
prospects for women, Ross affirmed the need for more revenue.
“We’ve encouraged lawmakers to look at ineffective tax breaks. There
always are ways to do things differently,” she said.
Ross also mentioned the need to make choices based on what is happening
in the economy at large and emphasized not placing unrealistic
expectations on families.
“Budgets are always about values and choices, and these clearly are
tough choices,” she declared. “The easy cuts have all been done.”
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